Toby, Annabelle and Ben present a special, transformational collectors’ edition in Gone By Lunchtime #50. Was the wellbeing budget truly transformational? Toby Manhire, Annabelle Lee and Ben Thomas size it up, along with the high drama prelude of the so-called Treasury hack. Plus: Is the time ripe for a new Christian Conservative political party? Either download this … Read more
What is a beltway issue? In the Treasury data breach story, as so often, it seems to be a byword for ‘a political event which is embarrassing for the party that I like’, writes Danyl Mclauchlan Since last week’s release of the budget and the subsequent media feeding frenzy about the so-called Treasury hack – … Read more
Treasury has been haemorrhaging talented economists for years and the budget leaks were just the tip of the iceberg for a department in crisis, writes Eric Crampton of The New Zealand Initiative. If the Canterbury earthquakes taught us anything, it’s that the immediate response to a disaster is a very different thing from the rebuilding that … Read more
The president of the Vic Uni students association is leading a ‘youthquake’ as five leaders under 25 try to follow Chlöe Swarbrick into the halls of power, writes Peter McKenzie. It wasn’t a conventional campaign launch. Someone’s laptop cycled through a Spotify playlist of grungy music. The oldest person present looked to be in their … Read more
New Zealand’s military role in Iraq remains obscure and largely beyond public scrutiny, despite recent government claims to be more transparent, writes Harmeet Singh Sooden. Qayyarah West Airfield is a Coalition air base located in northern Iraq, approximately 60 km south of Mosul. The air base was recaptured from ISIS by Coalition forces in July … Read more
The process by which information from the Treasury website was extracted has been the subject of much speculation, and a lot of confusion, writes Alexander Stronach in a post that has exploded since originally being published at The Understatesman The Treasury data breach has been a shitshow. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a bigger disconnect between … Read more
Former leader Gareth Morgan says The Opportunities Party’s remaining members are ‘grovelling, compromising political aspirants’ and that’s the least of new leader Geoff Simmons’ problems. Max Towle for RNZ In Depth asks: can Simmons rescue the party from itself – and does the party really hold any appeal to voters now its colourful founder is gone? … Read more
Our housing crisis is intimately linked to our prison overcrowding crisis, write Vanessa Cole and Ti Lamusse In May 2018, Charlotte was unexpectedly released from prison following a short period on remand. While in prison, Charlotte* lost her only source of income and the room she was renting. Her family were a major source of … Read more
In the land of hope and glory, the US president’s state visit is under way against a backdrop of wild insults between Donald Trump and the London mayor, Sadiq Khan. Here’s the backstory. Not since Lindsay Lohan slandered the Northamptonshire town of Kettering and failed to switch on their Christmas lights has a transatlantic feud … Read more
Two women who entered parliament at the age of 23, albeit 42 years apart, discuss their parliamentary experiences Read an extract from The Political Years by Marilyn Waring here When Chlöe Swarbrick is introduced at events, she finds herself hailed as the youngest person to be elected to parliament since Marilyn Waring. “I’m very sorry. … Read more
Why do we strike? Because the profession is in crisis. Because Immigration NZ declined my teacher mate’s residency application owing to the fact her pay is 39 cents an hour too little, writes Christchurch teacher Annabel Wilson. I turned my school email to auto-reply at midnight on May 29 because I quite often get emails … Read more
The state should massively increase its investment in teachers, but take off the blinkers and recognise the best teachers should earn more – it works in the rest of the economy, argues the ACT leader A recent Spinoff article starts by quoting me as wanting to set $1 million aside as a fund to better … Read more
What did international coverage get right about the 2019 Budget? Not a hell of a lot, writes Alex Braae. “I read the foreign news to understand my nation.” So said Matt Berninger of band The National, in a line from the song ‘Fashion Coat’. The government’s 2019 budget – the first ever Wellbeing Budget at … Read more
You may have seen the picture, but do you know the people and the policies behind it? Hayden Donnell takes a trip inside Auckland’s newest lobby group, OpenTheBooks. Read Clive Matthew-Wilson’s response to this article here Have you ever looked at Auckland’s sclerotic roads, its traffic jams stretching to the horizon, and thought: “You know … Read more
Should a convicted murderer be allowed to help run a charity? Can you start a charity to support your addiction? Should Greenpeace and Family First be treated differently? These and other issues are being addressed in the Charities Act review. How do you know that when you donate to a charity, your contribution is going … Read more
Grant Robertson should apologise, and the Treasury secretary should offer his resignation, writes Danyl Mclauchlan Information Technology, or IT is not an ancient discipline, like politics or the law, but it has its own traditions and the most hallowed tradition of all, held sacred by engineers and other technical specialists the world over is to … Read more
Police have rebuffed the Treasury secretary’s complaint about purported hacking of Budget information. So what really happened, and has Simon Bridges been vindicated? Metaphors abound when it comes to claims of hacking. Yesterday, following suspicions that the National Party had accessed parts of the Treasury website thought to be secure, the head of the most … Read more
There is no evidence of illegality on the part of the National Party, and they have succeeded in shining a light on parts of the Budget the government would prefer you didn’t reflect on, writes Brigitte Morten for RNZ One of the key advantages of being in government is that you get to largely set … Read more
The government has accepted the vast majority of the recommendations made by the mental health and addiction inquiry report. But which ones will actually see immediate action? Alex Braae reports. Out of 40 recommendations made to the government by the long-running mental health and addiction inquiry, 38 have been either accepted, or accepted in principle. … Read more
A brief technical explanation about what the ‘hack’ amounted to would be a lot more useful than all the bluster and nebulous waffle we’ve heard so far, writes Danyl Mclauchlan. Treasury’s budget documents are – potentially – very valuable information. They might affect currency valuations, or bond prices, or company share prices, or any number … Read more
As Treasury says it’s registered thousands of attempts to hack its secure site and Simon Bridges accuses Grant Robertson of maliciously lying, the wellbeing budget is about to become the hell-fleeing budget for someone The press releases started rolling in at 10 on the dot yesterday morning: “National reveals Budget details.” At 1.30pm: “National reveals … Read more
PM Jacinda Ardern will soon have the chance to reverse policy that prioritises Asia-Pacific immigrants over refugees from Africa and the Middle East. But how did that policy get made in the first place? After the attacks on Muslims at two mosques in Christchurch, attention has returned to restrictions on African and Middle Eastern refugees … Read more
With a capital gains tax off the political agenda, the opposition needs to find the government’s achilles heel. Liam Hehir goes looking through the options. This is the week of the “wellbeing” budget. Animating this bold vision for our future is an ironclad certainty that the one thing New Zealanders really need to be happy … Read more
Last week Hannah Tamaki, Destiny Church co-founder and wife of controversial church leader Brian Tamaki, was announced as the leader of Coalition NZ, a new conservative Christian political party seeking election in 2020. Otago University senior law lecturer Simon Connell remembers another equally controversial leadership bid. In 2011, Hannah Tamaki was nominated for the presidency … Read more
Zoe Mills is a 17 year old high school student and one of thousands who joined the global climate strikes. She explains why her generation feel this moment so acutely. It’s an eerie sight. A sea of bodies lay across the worn concrete of the Queen Street intersection. A faint murmuring grows in an impassioned roar: “Wake up! … Read more
RNZ’s Guyon Espiner investigates New Zealand’s central drug buyer Pharmac – how it works and whether its model is costing lives. In part one, he reveals how lung cancer patients are buying cut-price drugs from India, as other New Zealanders fundraise, petition and apply for clinical trials to access medications Pharmac won’t fund. Baden Ngan Kee … Read more
Yesterday, Destiny Church rebranded their political arm as The Coalition Party, and Tim Batt bought their domains before anybody else could. He writes on the value of online trolling as political protest. Brian Tamaki is the burned soft tissue on the roof of New Zealand’s mouth. If we could only bring ourselves to completely ignore … Read more
In this bonus edition of Gone By Lunchtime, the prime minister talks to Toby Manhire at the Auckland Writers Festival Last weekend at the Auckland Writers Festival, Jacinda Ardern spoke with Spinoff editor Toby Manhire about the extraordinary election campaign of 2017, and the book it inspired, Stardust and Substance, edited by Stephen Levine for … Read more
‘Milkshaking’ is on the rise in Brexit-divided Britain. But is throwing milky treats the best form of political protest? Hayden Donnell investigates. With just hours to go until polls opened in the European elections, Nigel Farage cowered in his campaign’s Brexit bus, surrounded on all sides by gangs of milkshake-throwing youths. Just weeks earlier, his … Read more